The Real Bill?

Will Clinton Autobiography Spill Any Beans Or Answer The Big Question: `Why?'

June 10, 2004|By LIZ HALLORAN; Courant Staff Writer

WASHINGTON — The most excruciatingly intimate details of his life have already been laid bare in the most public of documents.

He has been scrutinized by an endless cast of reporters, scholars, pop psychologists and members of the so-called ``vast right-wing conspiracy.''

His wife has written an international bestseller about her life with him. And if he's known for anything, it's his infuriating, entertaining, schedule-busting volubility.

Really, is there anything we don't already know about former President Clinton and his shopworn tale of the boy from Hope?

His publishers at Alfred A. Knopf think so: They paid Clinton an advance of more than $10 million for his massive, 957-page autobiography scheduled for release by booksellers June 22. Apparently so do readers: Pre-orders for ``My Life'' put it at No. 1 a month ago on the Amazon bestseller list, where it remains, and the publishing industry is anticipating its 1.5 million copy initial printing as the event of the year -- if not the century.

But whether the book will contain real news is anybody's guess. Clinton's been uncharacteristically mum, saying in a recent speech at a booksellers' convention in Chicago that he wrote a thorough book about growing up in the South, about policy and the presidency.

``The world is waiting with anticipation that Clinton will discuss everything he did right,'' said Donna Brazile, who managed former Vice President Al Gore's 2000 presidential campaign. ``But I am looking forward to reading what he would have done differently.''

Though Clinton in his speech did not specifically mention Monica Lewinsky, the White House intern whose sexual relationship with the president led to his impeachment, he said the book addresses his personal and political mistakes.

Mark Halperin, ABC News' political director, said he believes that Clinton knows the perils of writing a boring book. He is looking for the former president to delve into his personal feelings, including his disdain for Ken Starr, the special prosecutor who pursued the investigation into his relationship with Lewinsky, and to use the book to create part of the historical record of his presidency.

``For a guy who talked on and on, on the national stage, for more than eight years, we've actually rarely heard him talk about how he felt about the events of his presidency,'' said Halperin, who began covering then-Arkansas Gov. Clinton in 1992, during his first run for the presidency.

``If he gives us insight into what he was thinking at the time, or his true views, not just of his political opponents, but of his own actions -- that would, in fact, be what we call `new news,''' Halperin said.

The expected throngs of Clinton book buyers will likely thumb first to the section dealing with Lewinsky, hoping to answer the ``what were you thinking?'' question that has lingered since online gossip Matt Drudge broke the scandal in early 1998.

If there's a headline that comes from the book, says presidential scholar Alan Lichtman, ``it would have to be `Clinton Explains Monica.'''

``How in the world did he get embroiled in that?,'' said Lichtman, an American University history professor, who doesn't expect to get an answer in the book.

``But maybe his confessional side will come out,'' he said.

Halperin said he also doesn't expect the president to be forthcoming about the Lewinsky episode, adding, however, ``there's no shortage of other topics that he was constrained from speaking honestly and humanly about because of the demands of the office of the presidency.''

Clinton's rich trove of material includes two presidential elections, the showdown with Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich that led to a government shutdown, terrorism, the Gore campaign, and his relationship with his wife, Sen. Hillary Clinton, as well as her role in his administration.

Leon Panetta, who served as Clinton's chief of staff from 1994 to 1997, said the book is inherently important because, for the first time, ``you're going to be hearing it directly from President Clinton, as opposed to everybody else who has written about him and his administration.''

``Even when you've worked in an administration, talked with him every day, you're never quite sure what the thought processes are all about,'' Panetta said. ``This is the first time he's sat down and put in writing his feelings and thoughts -- about the budget crisis, the debate over health care, the struggle with the economic plan.

``People need to know that he has a mind like a steel trap -- he doesn't forget much,'' he said. ``The book is more than 900 pages, but it probably could have been 2,000.''

Scholars like Lichtman and Georgia Sorenson, who wrote a book about Clinton's leadership style, say they hope the former president provides a cogent explanation of his political ``third way'' -- finding a path that straddled moderate Democrats and moderate Republicans to create a new kind of Democrat.